Second Set of Readings

In "Severed Voices", Liebes and Pinchevski focus on how content and medium can come together to facilitate the healing of a collective tragedy by offering voices to those who had been denied their own stories by unspeakable horrors. Their discussion of media focused on the content, unlike the definition offered by Hansen and Mitchell, whose definition focused on the actual media as the content. They claim that radio allowed "for a new kind of participation at a distance", based on their studies of Holocaust accounts and interviews with Israelis who were young at the time. I see parallels (to varying degrees) to the television reports following the September 11th attacks, as well as the Challenger and Columbia tragedies and the Chilean mine rescue.

Morris' theoretical article explores how culture reacts to other cultures' influences and develops an understanding of the word "culture". Like Liebes and Pinchevski, Morris focuses on the collective experience of those within a culture, rather than the individual concerns. "Ideas and cultural symbols are carried from place to place by individuals and via communications technologies," which ultimately enhances the cultures these ideas and symbols come into contact with. The most interesting claim in Morris' article, though, was that "while identities may not be destroyed by imported media, local media industries are indeed vulnerable". Echoing the complaints against many a new Walmart, this claim is based on the value of local exportation of culture via media, as well as the reception of aspects of different cultures via the same media. By valuing local as a benefit to a global exchange, this argument makes "media culture" both local and global. I see the concerns of both Pinchevski and Liebes and Morris falling into the category of "Society" in Mitchell and Hansen's book.

Mattson's review states that "we use the term media to refer both to the instruments by which we distribute messages and to the messages themselves." And, as he praises the reviewed book for appealing to both layfolk and experts alike, I say Mattson sees media studies as inclusive, like Mitchell and Hansen's attempts to include as much of the various perspectives on media studies as possible. Also, like Liebes and Pinchevski, Mattson praises work that avoids falling into simplistic binaries.

D'Souza focuses mainly on the lack of politics in a work analyzing the work of Gustave Courbet, who used his art as a commodity by "selling out" to support the development of his more exciting works. The author D'Souza criticizes claims that this was how Courbet took advantage of a newly developing media culture involving the press. And D'Souza doesn't exactly disagree. D'Souza's criticism, then, that the book ignored the political entanglements of the painter shows that D'Souza sees media culture as at least partially political.

I see myself, thankfully, working towards a definition of terms and understanding of definitional differences in all of the different uses of the word media, as well as the word culture. There's hope. Possibly because of my struggle to conceptualize terms, I have spent most of my free time during the week pondering the similarities between these articles, hoping to have some sort of lightening bolt of inspiration strike me and help me see something more concrete...

I like the idea of an inclusive media studies, one that has conversations across disciplinary boundaries. I'm just going to work through the mind-vibrating cacophony that is, so far, my understanding of media studies. That, for right now, is where I am.